hideoblog

hideoblog

Hideo Kojima, the creator of the Metal Gear series, has started a blog called the "Hideoblog" at the Japanese Kojima Productions website. And he is on a roll. He's blogged every day this week, and twice on Monday. He speaks with remarkable candidness about the Metal Gear projects in the works, and relates anecdotes about his personal life. It's an interesting way to gain insight into what he's thinking about day to day. He also at times betrays an intriguing poetic sensibility. We excerpt a bit from his first three entries to give you a feeling for his writing.
Saturday September 24
Kojima starts by talking about Roppongi Hills --where Kojima Productions is located-- and how the area feels really different during the rain with people scuttling into the Kojima Productions building to escape the downpour. "[The building] was almost like a giant space shuttle," Kojima says, describing the mass entry of people. But despite the changing feel of Roppongi, Kojima says: "Yet, the inside of Kojima Productions is the same as always," in almost a pessimistic way.

The upcoming Metal Gear Solid 3: Subsistence has entered the final stages of debug. Kojima says that since the master disc is always changing, "yesterday's data won't work today". So they have to keep going through the game over and over again.
The jungle transforms into the true meaning of a jungle. For someone with no sense of direction like myself, I get lost in the caves every time.

One thing that Kojima enjoys talking about is the 3D camera which keeps the work on the game fresh and interesting despite a full year of non-stop development. An interesting point Kojima makes about the new 3d camera is, "What's troubling is that because the camera is 3D, the northern part of the screen isn't necessarily north anymore. So the jungle transforms into the true meaning of a jungle. For someone with no sense of direction like myself, I get lost in the caves every time."

But he's not all work and no play. Kojima then talks about seeing Charlie and the Chocolate Factory with his son. "Johnny Depp showed a great performance as always. I couldn't believe that he was almost the same age as me!" He starts thinking about his age and gets a little depressed about growing older. Kojima then goes into an analysis of the film saying, "The thought I had on seeing the film was 'Can Charlie fit into present-day?' The original novel was a classic, but in this 21st century will the allegory of the good old age reach the children?" He then goes on to talk about how Charlie and his family feel anachronistic in this modern era. His son tells him that these days most kids feel closer to the gamer Mike or the gotta-win Violet than the family-loving Charlie. Kojima comments, "In a material society of gluttony, tests, and forced competition these children can't become a Charlie. They aren't given the opportunity." In the end Kojima finishes his analysis of the film by asking "Really, will we ever return to an era that could produce a child like Charlie?"

After that Kojima talks about going to buy an album by Franz Ferdinand, but then finding out the album had been delayed a week when he got to the store. So instead he buys the first album of the band The Rakes and puts it on his iPod before going to work. He describes how at night he goes to the gym and takes a swim for the first time in a while and how in the Sauna he think of new ideas for MGS4 that he can tell co-director Murata Shou on Monday. By the end of his blog entry on Saturday, "The rain still hasn't stopped."

Sunday September 25th

The second entry begins again with a reference to the rain, which has stopped for a bit. Kojima is apparently quite a music fan - he writes about going for a drive listening to the latest Stellastar album, which reminds him of a funny story: "Two years ago a couple of my UK rock fans said 'The director [Kojima] will definitely like this band!' and recommended Stellastar. But I made a mistake and bought the album put out by Starsailor". Why is this important? He ended up liking the mistakenly purchased Starsailor album so much he used their track "Way to Fall" as the ending song for MGS3. If he'd never mis-heard the title of the band, MGS3 would have had a completely different ending song. But according to Kojima, "[situations like this are] just one of the things that makes life interesting".

Kojima then relates an anecdote about how he tried teaching his son how to do handstands the other night but ended up in some pain himself. Again, he writes about feeling old. Still thinking about staying in shape he wonders, "Should I use this opportunity to start doing daily headstands?"

Noting that the wind in Japan has picked up to a degree that wearing jackets has become necessary, Kojima updates his readers on the status of MGS3 Subsistence. According to him, "The 3D camera works, but for small areas, rooms, and such it's probably better to use the original overhead camera. Also when you get lost in the jungle, change to the overhead camera with the right stick and you'll figure out where you're going. So it's a good idea to use both cameras. Should we use both even in MGS4? I need to give this another look," giving a glimpse into how the camera system of MGS4 could function.

After this he starts talking about watching MGS3:S producer Yoshikazu Matsuhana doing checks on the MSX version of Metal Gear 2 that are to be included in Subsistence. The game brings back nostalgic feelings for Kojima and playing it he says, "Metal [Gear] hasn't changed at all," despite being 18 years old. Kojima goes on to comment that the frequent use of Elevators are played a big part of MG1,2 and MGS1,2, and yet were absent in MGS3. "The elevator is an important gimmick of the MGS series. Originally the film Zombie and the feeling of tension created from using an elevator inspired me so I adopted the idea. That's why an elevator is an important stage-setting object in a 'stealth' game. What about in MGS4?" Kojima writes.

Kojima then beings to talk about the famous illustrator Komatsuzaki Shigeru who sadly passed away in 2001. Komatsuzaki actually did a MGS2 art piece for the Japanese MGS2 Limited Edition release. This picture featured Snake and the Metal Gear Ray duking it out in front of the moon and the statue of liberty: a picture which still impresses Kojima. He then mentions that currently an art exhibition featuring Komatsuzaki's works is traveling around Japan. Kojima flips through a catalogue of Komatsuzaki's images that he got from the Asahi Newspaper. He reflects that his generation was raised on Komatsuzaki's illustrations: "We find his images fascinating and long for the unexplored regions of space, the future, the latest weaponry, and overall the unknown universe that tickles the heart of a young boy". Kojima talks about how Komatsuzaki's pictures gave dreams to the kids of his generation and sent them excitedly into the future looking to explore the unknown. Turning the discussion to the current generation, Kojima ends the days' blog on a serious note. "If the children of today are lacking in dreams, then it's because we the creators have failed. The responsibility lies on us. We have to leave behind dreams for the children."

Monday September 26th
Kojima starts by talking about TGS and how the two most often asked questions from the foreign press were, "Why is MGS4 Snake an old man?" and "Why have you [Hideo] returned for MGS4?". He then proceeds to write in the blog about how the theme of the MGS trilogy was about passing along information to the next generation. Kojima notes that, "At the same time I had planned to pass on information not only to gamers, but I had planned to pass the soul of MGS and how to make MGS to the internal staff as well. This young staff that had fought together through three titles with me was supposed pass me [similar to Snake's surpassing The Boss] and jump into the new battlefield (MGS4)". Yet despite what he wanted to pass along, he writes, "But the soul and the will didn't make it through, neither to the users nor to the staff. If there's something I want to leave behind with MGS, it's the will (SENSE)," and with this he gives what might be the first look at the theme of MGS4.
If there's something I want to leave behind with MGS, it's the will.

Kojima writes that most game creators in the industry make a hit game and then leave it for the company to create sequels, leaving to form their own company or to move into management. But that's not what Kojima wants. "...I like to make games. I want to stick to making games and only I can prove this. Old Man Snake has this determination of a middle-aged man built into him".

From here Kojima moves on to his personal life where he was re-united with Andre Norton's "Graveyard of the Universe", a book he hadn't seen since his Jr. High days.[Editor's note: we are unable to find this title by celebrated science fiction writer Andre Norton. It may be a different title for Japanese publication.] Kojima talks about how he bought the book due in part to Leiji Matsumoto's illustrations since he's a huge Matsumoto fan. Kojima writes, "The contents [of the book] were great. Due to the book, I graduated from Mystery novels and turned my admiration towards Sci-Fi...You could say that this book changed my destiny." Kojima then talks about how the book is still great and that quality titles never seem to age.

Finally Kojima talks about his work for the day and how he's going to be conducting interviews to hire more people at Kojima Productions. According to Kojima, "half of making a game is deciding which people to hire." He mentions that he's starting to work on the audio check for the third movie disc in Subsistence and about how getting the sound mix of the effects, dialogue, and music just right is pretty difficult. He ends by describing how watching the cutscenes with no game sections surrounding them give the story a bit of a different feel, and that they have to be careful to keep a good pace for this 'film' version. His last words of the day are, "It's the middle of the night and I'm still doing game checks at work. The ending is quite a ways away".